Trim was the destination as I loaded the bike in to the car and set off for the inaugural Boyne Adventure Race.
After dropping the bike at the drop zone I headed for the start area. This was in a great location in front of Trim castle, The Race around Ireland start was getting set up there also for the grand depart a few hours later so lots of people buzzing around and you could feel the excitement that both events were generating. A volunteer I asked for directions was beaming as she told me about all the work that had gone in to getting ready for the day and lots of supporters were on hand to cheer everyone on…there seemed to be a huge bunch of local athletes taking part but there was a good sprinkling of blow ins there too! The BAR was part of the Trim Salmon of Knowledge festival.
Was great to catch up with the Ultimate Conditioning crew and have a chat beforehand, they were very well represented again…and I tried to get a bit of local knowledge out of them that might help on the course!
After an interesting Yoga based warm up we lined up at the start and in no time were on our way.
It was a blistering pace as we headed out around The Porchefields for the opening 4km run mostly on grass…even running at just over 4min / km pace I was in about 16/17th place and about 2 minutes down at end of the run…but looking forward to the Kayak! I got in a single kayak and was soon paddling like crazy down the Boyne…1 or 2 of the faster runners were having a little trouble with the kayak and as I passed them I could hear the civil defence folks in the water ‘advising’ them to keep out of the trees…”the trees are not your friend” was one comment I heard!!!
I made good progress in the kayak and although a double caught me right before the end of the 1km section I had made up about 6 places so was in about 12th or so heading for the bike transition. A unique feature of this race was that you had to bring our kayak with you out of the river and drag it about 20 metres up the bank and to a drop area….that got the blood flowing back to the legs fairly rapidly!
The first bike stage was 21km…flat and fast…4 of us got in a nice group and worked together reasonably well for about 70% of it…we passed another 2-3 on the road and got to the next transition area in good time.
The second run stage was 3km , a little run to a quarry, a dirt road run and a climb up 2 embankments and the back the dirt road to the bike…a nice little run, it’s always great when a little segment like this is added, makes you glad you have the trail runners on, and gives us slower runners a little chance to claw a few seconds back!
Final stage was 3km on the bike back to Trim, again this was fast and furious and I crossed the line in 1:22 and in 12th place…which considering this was a fast course I was very happy with!
A nice mug accompanied a medal and water at the finish line…which was by now starting to buzz with the excitement of The Race Around Ireland which was about to kick off.
So a nice scenic course, a very nice tshirt, mug, medal, plenty of water….and at a very reasonable entry fee this was not only a very enjoyable race it was also a really great value race!
A bit of chat with the Ultimate Conditioning gang about our plans for the next event (Quest Achill) and I loaded up the bike in to the car again and hit the road home with a smile 
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